


No Prophet

by BelowBedlam



Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age - All Media Types
Genre: Angst, Gen, Short One Shot
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-01-14
Updated: 2016-01-14
Packaged: 2018-05-13 22:53:15
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 455
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5720002
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/BelowBedlam/pseuds/BelowBedlam
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Andraste is an insomniac and The Maker a relentless suitor.<br/>A short ditty on the Lady of Sorrow.</p>
            </blockquote>





	No Prophet

Nothing has come easily to her, not sleeping, not children, not love or victory. She waits an age between each opportunity and snatches it when they come near like curious, hungry things whose teeth she readily welcomes. 

She finds victory in freedom, gives and is given children, holds her love in heart as they conspire together, waxing poetic on war. At night she examines her skin for puncture wounds and finds none. Afterwards she sings to Them, because it is seemingly never her destiny to overcome insomnia. 

….

She feels Them pass through her like a flurry of cool breezes, beseeching her.

_Please._

They show her everything; she has held the seed of life between her fingers, has peered into it like the eye of a needle and seen things without words to speak them. It is easier to call Them gods. God. Only the one, an eye through which everything she’s known is realized.

It is They who steal sleep from her yet plague her with dreams, who still her body so that it won’t pull its own seams at the advent of millennia seeping into her knowledge. She tells her people of Them to rid herself of the clutter, watches her listeners drink her incompetent words down until she can hear her own breathing again.

_Yours. All of it. Please._

They beg her. They want her. She remembers every lash carved into her back and sings the freedom songs of slaves in tripped-tongue Tevene:  _I want this._

 _Revenge is a mistake,_ They say, and fall silent as she raises her army.

…

When she is betrayed, she dreams with her eyes open and sees fire; The flames are neither so treacherous as Maferath’s tongue nor brighter than the righteous rage consuming her heart, but their promises hold truer than the Maker’s.

That’s sacrilegious, but it’s alright; They have always been the most forgiving of her spouses, if not the most gentle. 

In the morning she will be eaten alive, anyway.

…

Shartan dies first, which would be funny if the smell of her own smoke wasn’t suffocating her. 

Her only regret is that she is bound once more.

When the final kindness pierces her heart, she squints in the reflected light of the blade and sees a face. It blinks when she blinks. The skin is eaten away by fire.

_I weep for your flesh._

Their voice is an echo, far away. Another funny thing, if only she had more time.

Andraste sighs as They turn from her, sustains the exhale as the light from the sword stops blinding her. As the fire stops hurting. She does not breathe again.

She feels heavy, and light, and remembers to close her eyes. _Yours._

They grant her sleep.

**Author's Note:**

> I'd appreciate feedback on this one in particular, as it's my first time writing Dragon Age outside of Iron Bull or my OC(s).  
> I been digging more into the religious lore and andraste/the maker is fascinating. I also just have a thing with gods and their chosen humans.
> 
> Thanks for reading!


End file.
